ANOTHER QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE by Dave Goode

Fight Comics 32...Tiger Girl

The argument can always be made that the most popular Tarzan comic book imitator was Sheena, Queen of the Jungle. Her popularity would lead to the creation of a number of "jungle queen" imitations. My favorite of the Golden Age Sheena imitations was Tiger Girl created by Robert Webb and often drawn by legendary good girl artist Matt Baker. Appearing originally in Fight Comics No. 32 from Fiction House in 1944 she was no relation to the Tiger Woman from Republic Pictures. THE TIGER WOMAN (1944) was a 1944 serial that starred the stunning Linda Stirling, who just might have made a great Tiger Girl.

Linda Stirling as Tiger Woman

Someone else who would have made a good Tiger Girl would have been my favorite ecdysiast Lilly "The Cat Girl" Christine. It has been reported that the sensual Miss Christine was considered by producer Sol Lesser to play Sheena of the Jungle in a series of films in the late 1940s. Unfortunately that series never materialized. 

She would have been great as the whip - wielding Princess Vishnu a.k.a Tiger Girl who fought the forces of evil in the Indian jungle with her pet tiger Benzali.

There was another Tiger Girl in the Silver Age of Comics. She was a one-shot character that appeared in her own title from Gold Key in 1968. Created by Superman's co-creator Jerry Siegal and Jack Sparling. A fun little story starring circus performer Lilly Taylor who put on a tiger - striped costume and fought the bad guys in this high camp adventure with the aid of her pet tiger "Kitten" and other performers of the circus. I really wish there had been more than one story.

And now, Dave Goode and Vance Capley present

a brand new Golden Adonis strip!

ONE MAN'S NOSTALGIA PART TWO by Dave Goode

Do you remember the television series LOVE THAT BOB/THE BOB CUMMINGS SHOW (1955 to 1959). It starred Bob Cummings as Bob Collins, a suave ladies man and photographer working in Hollywood, and his interactions with his models, family and secretary. Bob Collins was the first pin-up photographer that I was introduced to. And though he was a womanizer he was still depicted as being more or less a nice guy.

Art by Dave Stevens

That wasn't always the case for glamour popular fiction where they were quite often depicted as "sharp-shooters" taking advantage of innocent young girls from "Small Town, America" who come to big cities with stars in their eyes. This was often the case in exploitation paperbacks and grind house movies.

 

This made for interesting reading and movie viewing. But there was probably nothing further from the truth. How much business would a pin-up photographer get once they got a reputation as being a skirt-chaser? But of course that's what young boys fantasized about. Scoring with the models they saw in "girlie mags". And of course teenaged boys were under the impression that these photogs were getting this action. This was reinforced by Russ Meyers who had married two of his models and dated a number of others.

And then there was the fantasy of saving some naive young model from the clutches of an unscrupulous photographer who was in fact a (gasp) pornographer. I've used this story line in comics with both my Dr. Judo and Mr. Incognito characters. But this is seldom the case. In fact in the Mr.Incognito strip the model berates the American luchador for his rescue. And is worried that she's not going to get paid for the session that the masked man broke up. The models are adults who have made a grown up decision. And they're also quite able to take care of themselves when it comes to handling a lech as Miss Ginger Snaps does in the new comic by myself and Vance Capley.

Dave Goode copyright 2019

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ZAN...THE FORGOTTEN TARZAN by Dave Goode

One of my favorite ersatz Tarzans was Zan, King of the Jungle (1969). The star of this European production known alternately as Tarzan En La Gruta Del Oro (TARZAN IN THE GOLDEN GROTTO) and KING OF THE JUNGLE the movie's star Steve Hawkes claimed the film company that produced the flick couldn't pay the licensing fee to the Edgar Rice Burroughs estate for the use of the Tarzan name. And so they simply cut the jungle hero's name in half. 

In any case the production was a fairly entertaining flick that was filmed in Africa, Florida, Italy  Spain, and Suriname. And it featured something that was rarely seen in a Tarzan movie since MGM's TARZAN THE APE MAN (1932). Tarzan in mortal combat with a gorilla.

The movie's star Steve Hawkes was born Stepjen "Steve" Sipek in Croatia and relocated to Canada in 1959. I've read interviews with Hawkes where he claimed to be a champion swimmer (Johnny Weissmuller was his boyhood hero) and the winner of the Mr.Canada bodybuilding title before becoming a professional wrestler. The latter was pure "kayfabe". There is no record of him winning the Mr. Canada championship. There have been any number of well - built pro wrestlers who billed themselves as Mr. America or Mr. Universe without having won those titles. Or even having competed in those contests.

There was a sequel to KING OF THE JUNGLE, TARZAN AND THE BROWN PRINCE (1972) that had a similar plot to the Jock Mahoney movie TARZAN'S THREE CHALLENGES (1963). Hawkes played the lead in this flick and his co- star from the first movie Kitty Swan returned as well. 

 

Swan had starred in a jungle movie of her own as GUNGALA, VIRGIN OF THE JUNGLE (1967). An accident on the set of TARZAN AND THE BROWN PRINCE left Hawkes and Swan both horribly burned when they were tied down for a scene and a fire got out of control. A lion on the set who was trained to free the actors from their bonds for the scene actually saved them.Hawkes would relocate to Loxahatchee, Florida where he opened an animal sanctuary. News services of course wrote him up as a real life Tarzan. But in 2012 he was arrested and his animals confiscated for "non regulatory compliance in regards to animal permits".

THE MAN OF MYSTERY by Dave Goode

THE MAN OF MYSTERY

by Dave Goode

When I first started collecting (saving) comics back in the early 1960s I was lucky enough to live next door for about three years to a kid who read comics. But never saved them. This gave me extra comics that I could trade. And other comics that I never had to buy. One of these comics was FLY MAN No.31 (May 1965). The Fly Man was originally a character called The Fly who was created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby. This comic book introduced me to several characters that were new to me. In the course of the story the Fly Man teamed up with the Shield, who I immediately pegged as a Captain America imitation. Little did I know at this time in my life the reality. And there was the Comet, a sci-fi superhero in an ugly green and orange costume. And then there was the Black Hood, a  "man of mystery" on a flying robot horse named "Nightmare". To this day I can't put my finger why, but I thought the Black Hood was neat. Maybe it's because the other heroes in this comic were super-powered. And I always liked heroes who didn't have "powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal man".

 

I started trading for back issues of The Fly that featured the Black Hood. I would later find out that the Black Hood character came from the Golden Age of Comics. He debuted in Top Notch Comics No. 9 (October 1940). He was the creation of Harry Shorten and Al Camy who was the original artist on the feature. Shorten was a  pretty interesting character himself. Writer, editor and publisher Shorten played halfback for the NYU football team. He earned a degree in geology there before going on to a brief career in pro football. Aside from creating the Black Hood he co-created that Shield character with Irv Novick. And I would find out that character actually pre-dated Captain America. He also created the long-running single panel comic There Oughta Be A Law with illustrator Al Fagaly. Later Shorten would become the publisher of Midwood Books. A publishing house that produced adult, but not pornographic books.

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Black Hood was Police Officer Kip Burland who was framed for a crime he didn't commit by a criminal mastermind known as the Skull. Burland would be trained by a mysterious hermit known as the Hermit (you have to love the Golden Age) and fights crime as the Black Hood as he attempts to clear his name. I've never read the original origin story. But I wonder if part of his training regimen involved judo and jiu jitsu. I'm sure he must have used the seo nage technique at least once in the course of his Golden Age adventures.

 

During the Silver Age of Comics the Black Hood would be Archie Comics No.2 martial arts hero after Bobby Bell of the Young Shields of America Club. But where Bell gave judo and jiu jitsu lessons in the pages of The Fly. The Black Hood taught karate basics in the pages of The Fly and The Jaguar.

 

His martial arts skills would serve him well when in Mighty Comics No.42 (January 1966) he faces off against a villain known as the Karate Master in a story written by Jerry Siegel, the co-creator of Superman, and drawn by Paul Reinman. And no Karate Master doesn't have the same ring as Judo Master.

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